U2 is back in more ways than one on its new album All That You Can't Leave Behind, the band's twelfth album in its legendary twenty-four year career. The music scene has greatly changed in the past three years since the release of their previous effort, Pop. All of the group's albums from the last decade consisted of the band constantly reinventing its sound, culminating with the one album fling with electronica on Pop, which got mixed reviews from fans and critics alike.
Now, U2 is back to more familiar and unfamiliar territory this time around, opting for a cleaner, traditional rock sound that characterized two of its biggest albums, 1984's The Unforgettable Fire and 1987's The Joshua Tree. However, the new album also incorporates some of the '90s sonic elements off of the band's last few releases, such as pianos, synthesizers, and programming. The band even hooked up with The Unforgettable Fire/The Joshua Tree producers Daniel Lanois and Brian Eno to work on this album. Keep in mind not to consider this album something like the unforgettable Joshua Tree just because they are working with the same production team and trying to recapture and reinvent the sound that characterizes those albums.
The result of this effort is a collection of eleven new songs that musically fuse the best elements of U2's career into a brand new direction: rock, blues, gospel, R&B, and a little bit of pop put together to create a new sound. Drummer Larry Mullen and bassist Adam Clayton set the rhythm that is such an important element to the band's well-crafted signature sound. Guitarist the Edge (a.k.a. Dave Evans) comes up with some great new parts, sometimes going for an edgier distorted sound but also relying on his classic delay-driven tone that U2 fans have come to know and love over the years. Frontman Bono (which is much more of a rock star name than "Paul Hewson") is back with his trademark vocal style and some of his best lyrics in years.
The band recently took a page out of its own "Where the Streets Have No Name" video and performed a quick three song set of some of the new material on top of MTV's Times Square studios with thousands of fans watching and listening on the street below. Lyrically, U2 carries on singing about politics, spirituality/religion, and love - the three main topics that characterized much of their earlier material.
The first song on the album (and also the first single), "Beautiful Day," was used by NBC as the theme song for the Sydney Summer Olympics. The video, directed by Jonas Akerlund, features the band walking around and performing in various locations in Charles De Gaulle International Airport in Paris - as do all the album's photographs. According to Bono, the song is about "a person who loses everything and has never been happier."
The next song "Stuck in a Moment You Can't Get Out Of" has a sort of gospel vibe to it, strongly driven by a piano melody. "Elevation" features the band revisiting some of its early '90s experimental sounds, including a dominating synthesizer melody that sets the tone for much of the song.
"Walk On," on the other hand, sounds like something left over from the 1980s. U2 revisits a lot of its classic sounds, and this politically-themed track brings back memories from the War album. "Kite" is a somber violin-driven song, what some could interpret as a criticism of the music business. "In a Little While" follows it up with a mellow, clean guitar riff that borders on the verge of modern radio.
"Wild Honey" is an acoustic guitar-driven, playful, poppy song, somewhat comparable in vibe and spirit to "In a Little While." The next two songs, "Peace on Earth" and "When I Look at the World," are politically-themed once again. "Peace on Earth" is mellower, and the title sums up the entire song: Bono's vision of a perfect world. "When I Look at the World" is edgier, featuring some excellent slide guitar parts and much more critical lyrical content.
Nearing the end of the album, "New York" is an homage and commentary on the city that never sleeps. Driven by dance-style electronic and acoustic drumming as well as synthesizer and the Edge's alternating mellow and blistering guitar work, this is one of the best tracks on the album - which they appropriately performed on a rooftop in Times Square a few days ago. The final song is the blues-esque "Grace," a song about love and political activism - though it depends on which perspective you choose.
While the mainstream has been dominated by bland, boring bands and pop acts with nothing meaningful to say, U2 is a tremendous breath of fresh air, having produced what is easily its best album since Achtung Baby. This is a time when meaningful, intelligent, passionate music is in short supply, which further adds to the significance of this album.
In a time when a lot of the great '90s bands have either split up or had a massive falling out (add Rage Against the Machine to that list of casualties), new releases by bands like U2 or Radiohead command your immediate attention and respect. MTV VJ Carson Daly summed it all up when (on multiple occasions) he simply referred to U2 as "the best band in the world."
